How to Improve Meeting Show Rate

Publish Date

May 1, 2024

Author

Dan Brockwell

In many sales organisations, SDRs put so much effort into booking a discovery call, but comparatively, so little into ensuring that call takes place.

Typically, the show rate for most organisations will be somewhere between 65%-85%, noting that this will depend on industry vertical and persona.

Oftentimes, relevant prospects will miss or cancel meetings due to a lack of clear communication or insufficient context from previous interactions.

Making a few subtle but intentional changes during and after calls can make a massive downstream difference to qualified opportunity numbers.

Let’s run through a few key tips during and after calls to ensure that meetings booked are sat!

#1: Framing Value & Expectations For The Meeting

In order to get the prospect to attend a meeting, it needs to be framed in a way where the value is disproportional to the time spend, and the ‘pressure to buy’ is not felt.

Sell the meeting, not the product.

Make it clear that the meeting helps them to better understand whether your product is the right fit for their needs, rather than aggressively declaring your product IS the best fit.

Rather than using the word “meeting” (who wants more meetings right?), consider alternative terms like “a deeper chat”, “consultation”, “walkthrough”, “a more in-depth call”.

Likewise, rather than “account executive”, consider terms that suggest more value-add to the prospect like “product specialist”, “industry expert”, “product expert”, etc.

Make it seem like the natural course of action with social proof and positioning, suggesting that other businesses in their vertical / other people in their role often find the next meeting valuable for specific reasons.

Example phrase:

“Typically, most X businesses with Y challenges find it most helpful to have a deeper chat with our product specialists to analyse their current system and understand whether our product would make sense for their goals.”

Try to use a casual, friendly tonality that doesn’t rush or push the customer too hard, as otherwise, they may reluctantly book a meeting to get off the phone.

#2: Review Qualification Technique

Oftentimes, no-shows happen because not enough pain has been uncovered to make the meeting seem valuable or worthwhile to the prospect, or because they’re not actually the ideal person to speak to.

For reps struggling with show rate, review calls to see if you're sufficiently digging into pains (need) and the prospect’s role in the business (authority). The better you understand the pain of the prospect, the more effectively you can tailor your pitch to sell the meeting.

#3: Avoid Oversharing on Cold Calls

It’s great to be transparent with customers and show value early. However, giving too much detail on the call and keeping the conversation dragging on can sometimes inhibit the incentive for the prospect to even come to a further meeting.

If they feel like they have enough info to make a decision themselves, why attend? It’s a delicate balance of giving enough information to show the product could be beneficial to their needs, but also leaving ‘carrots’ for the prospect to get out of going to the meeting.

#4: Prompt, Clear Calendar Invites

Send a calendar invite at the same time as verbally booking a meeting with a prospect, or failing that, immediately after.

If sent at the same time as speaking to the prospect, verbally confirm with them that it showed up in their inbox, as there could be cases where the email is incorrect or it went to spam.

Make clear in the meeting title what the meeting is about, and in the description, reiterate the goal + high-level agenda of the meeting.

#5: Personalised Confirmation Emails

Send an email immediately after the first conversation showing appreciation for their time, sharing a summary of the pains & goals they shared, and reiterating the value of the next meeting for them.

Keep building rapport in this email, maybe even adding a personalised reference to something the prospect may have mentioned about their week or other priorities.

Bonus: add the prospect on LinkedIn if they haven’t already so the prospect gets more context on the business + you get another channel to engage with the prospect if unresponsive later.

#6: Reminder Message or Call

The day before a meeting is scheduled, send a reminder message via email, text or LinkedIn to confirm the time still suits the prospect.

Try to add a personal touch and ask about something the prospect mentioned they were doing in your previous conversation e.g. a holiday, onboarding a new hire, a company event, etc.

If the prospect has not yet accepted the calendar invite by this point, they will generally be at higher risk of no-show. Give them another call to confirm the meeting, and if they can’t make it, find another time in the near future.

You may even wish to do this earlier if the prospect hasn’t accepted the calendar invite within 24 hours of receiving it.

#7: Reviewing Cancellation & No-Show Trends

Dive into the metrics and understand the patterns in which prospects cancelled or did not show up to meetings.

In particular, look at the following datapoints:

1. Persona:
1. How junior or senior was the person they booked with?
2. What function do they sit within?
3. What is their role in the decision making process?
2. Meeting Time: What day and time was the meeting set for? Some times may be more prone to other commitments coming up, particularly Mondays and Fridays.
3. Initial Objections: What concerns did this prospect raise during the initial communication before? It could be that certain objections were not sufficiently handled.
4. Pre-Meeting Communication: What messages and followups were sent to the prospect on what channels?
5. Calendar Invite Acceptance: Did they accept the calendar invite?
6. Cancellation Reasons: For prospects that actively declined meetings, identify the most common objections that surfaced in their reply.

Based on understanding where most dropoffs occur, focus on the objection handling, call closing approach and post-call communication to address issues identified, being focused on 1-2 core areas of improvement at a time.